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(02/22/17 10:16pm)
For the Macon Pops’ annual fundraiser, the community orchestra is bringing back iconic Georgia music to Macon with a concert entitled “Macon Pops: The Music of Ray Charles.” The concert will take place on Friday, Feb. 24 at 7:30 p.m. at the Cox Capitol Theatre. “The Music of Ray Charles” will be a celebration of the iconic singer, songwriter, musician and composer.
The Macon Pops was formed to bring the highest-quality production and performance of popular music to a broader audience than traditional symphonic concerts. The orchestra blends classical instruments with popular music. Macon Pops has a unique music style and popular food and drinks since Moonhanger is catering.
According to the orchestra’s website, “the musical group showcases an orchestra of accomplished studio and symphonic musicians that encourages an interest in the musical arts for people of diverse ages and backgrounds.”
The event’s audience will also experience the musical talents of two local artists, Charles Davis and Kim Epps. Davis is local singer/songwriter and has performed as part of many events in and around Middle Georgia. Epps is a Grammy Urban Music Award Winner and a semi-finalist on American Idol. The concert will also be catered by El Camino, the Moonhanger group’s newest restaurant.
Because February is Black History Month, the founders of the Macon Pops, Steve Moretti and Matt Catingub, want to showcase the music of one of America’s most influential African American artists.
“It’s always a joy celebrating the music of one of the greatest musical talents of the 20th century,” Catingub said.
To find out more about the Macon Pops, the concert, and ticketing, visit www.maconpops.com.
(02/20/17 5:32pm)
Instead of focusing on the incredible performance of Lady Gaga at the 51st Super Bowl, some chose to go on social media during the show and criticize her body.
On Instagram, people called her out and said, “Lady Gaga needs to do some crunches if she wants to show her flabby belly” and “Tried to enjoy Lady Gaga’s performance, was distracted by the flab on her stomach swinging around.”
When I saw those comments, I was shocked because I know people who would kill for a body like hers, including me.
Because of this kind of backlash, there are a lot of women with eating disorders and self-esteem issues.
We live in a society that is striving for an unrealistic image of perfection. Instead of loving ourselves and others for our differences, we judge and tear down each other because of self-image problems and as a means of lifting ourselves up.
The comments on Lady Gaga’s belly shows how fat-phobic and diet-cultured our society can be.
This is proven to be true by the people who spent the duration of Gaga’s performance drawing attention to her appearance rather than her show.
We must fix this problem by learning to love and accept our flaws.
When Lady Gaga chose to respond, her focus wasn't on the negative comments. Instead, she used it to send a positive message to those who feel insecure about their bodies.
On Instagram she wrote, “I heard my body is a topic of conversation so I wanted to say, I'm proud of my body and you should be proud of yours too. No matter who you are or what you do. I could give you a million reasons why you don't need to cater to anyone or anything to succeed. Be you, and be relentlessly you. That's the stuff of champions. thank you so much everyone for supporting me. I love you guys. Xoxo, Gaga.”
Lady Gaga is someone who has spent years fighting against bullying and has always encouraged her “Little Monsters,” her fan club, to love themselves just the way they are through her Born This Way Foundation.
Despite the negativity surrounding her performance, Gaga’s UK and US sales went up and pulled in 117.5 million viewers, making it the second most-viewed halftime show, behind Katy Perry at 120.7 million viewers.
At The Grammy’s last week, instead of hiding her body, Gaga wore a daring and revealing outfit that showed off her stomach that could have been seen as a message to show she embraces the skin that she's in.
(11/15/16 4:58pm)
Little Mix, made up of members Jade Thirlwall, Perrie Edwards, Leigh-Anne Pinnock and Jesy Nelson, was put together in the eighth season of the UK’s “The X Factor,” and the group went on to win the competition. The group now has three albums, “Salute,” “DNA” and “Get Weird,” and is preparing for the release of a fourth, “Glory Days”.
When listening to “Get Weird,” I was always on the verge of tears because everything they sang about was something that everyone has experienced at one point of their lives.
If I could describe the music in one word, it would be spiritual. When you listen to it, you experience a sea of emotions to the point where your own heart doesn't know what to feel.
For anyone who has gone through or currently is going through a heartbreaking experience, I recommend listening to “Secret Love Song,” “Love or Leave Me” and “The End.” These songs will make you feel as if they were written for you.
For those who are a sucker for love songs, listen to “I Love You” and “Lightening.” Boy or girl, I can almost guarantee there's a song for you.
My personal favorite song on the album is “Secret Love Song” because it’s impossible for me not to get lost in it. The song is about hush-hush relationships and can be interpreted as a song about a couple that feel that they can’t be together. It’s a mid-tempo ballad that is also a heart-tugger.
The lyrics that stuck out to me the most are “Stolen moments that are we steal as the curtain falls / It will never be enough” and “Why can’t you hold me in the streets? / Why can’t I kiss you on the dance floor? / I wish it could be like that . . . cause I’m yours.” These lyrics touched me because I couldn’t have expressed an unattainable love that is so close that you can almost touch it any better.
I highly recommend listening to Little Mix's music. These women have amazing voices and deserve to be recognized. They make the type of music that can hit you hard and make you want to scream it out loud no matter who’s around.
The most surprising thing is that even after you are done listening to it, the feeling you experience from it remains. That's how you can tell how good a song is: when it leaves a mark deep in your soul.
The group’s fourth album, “Glory Days,” will be released Nov. 18, so be prepared for more great music from Little Mix.
(11/10/16 2:13am)
The Macon community is invited to enjoy an afternoon of beautiful music. The Mercer Singers and University will join with the Robert McDuffie Center for Strings for a performance of John Rutter’s “Requiem” at the Mulberry United Methodist Church on Nov. 13 at 4:00 p.m.
The concert will feature 150 choir members, including Mercer students, faculty and members of the community, as well as a 34-member orchestra for the performance. Admission is free of charge with a Mercer ID.
John Rutter first had the idea of writing the requiem in 1983, and his impulses were both personal and musical. Rutter was experiencing a time of great sadness due to the death of his father, and he wanted to remember him in music.
After working for months, the teachers and students have learned the requiem. At the beginning of the year, the university choir includes singers both experienced and inexperienced. With their musical instructor, Stanley Roberts, they learned to work together to create a unified sound.
"Singing in Mercer Singers is such a privilege, and being able to perform the John Rutter Requiem alongside the Middle Georgia Choral Society has been a great experience. Singing this Requiem adds a diverse element to our overall educational experience and i'm more than excited to be a part of it," said Kaitlyn Adams
For more information on the “Requiem” concert and upcoming concerts, visit the Townsend School of Music’s website at music.mercer.edu.
(10/16/16 4:32pm)
Marc Jacobs was the center of controversy when his fashion show for the 2017 spring/summer lines featured models wearing pastel dreadlocks with brown makeup/black face. As a black woman, I wasn’t offended when I heard about it because I interpreted it as his way of expressing himself through his art and nothing more. But when I listened to Jacob’s response to critics and learned that little to no women of color were used in his fashion show, I was offended and ashamed.
Dreadlocks are a staple in the black community and have been for thousands of years. Instead of crediting the black culture as his inspiration, he credits club kids, Marilyn Manson, Harajuku girls and Lana Wachowski. Even the people working with him gave Marc Jacobs credit for making locs look more sophisticated and fashionable, when before, it was considered street and raw. I found it insulting that it depicted locs as being unprofessional on a black person, yet it was boho chic when Marc Jacob featured them.
This wasn’t even the first time he failed to credit the black community. In his 2015 fashion show, he used bantu knots or what he calls “twisted mini buns” and again credited others for his inspiration instead of the people who actually created them. Even in his line of foundations, Jacobs demonstrates how he can be blind to dark skin. Out of the 22 shades he includes in his line of foundation, only one is for colored women.
As soon as the first runway model walked out, social media blew up. It might have passed over, but after someone had suggested that using more women of color would have been better, Marc Jacobs lashed out on social media. On a twitter post, Jacobs responded to critics by saying, “all who cry ‘cultural appropriation’ or whatever nonsense about any race of skin color wearing their hair in any particular style or manner – funny how you don’t criticize women of color for straightening their hair,” he wrote.
When I read that, I could no longer defend his fashion show as artistic, but now viewed it as an insult to the black community. Not only did he fail to give proper recognition to the black community for the inspiration of locs, but he responds to his criticism with an attack on the black culture.
Straight hair is not a cultural appropriation. The societal norm forces black women to assimilate to the “dominant” culture that punishes and keeps black women from wearing their natural curls. I know from personal experiences that there are black women out there that are getting fired from their jobs because their curls or locs are viewed as unprofessional. I’ve read stories where little kids have gotten kicked out of school because they refused to put their hair in a bun or straighten it.
Tayjah Deleveaux started a movement called #supportthepuff after her high school, C.R. Walker Senior High School, chastised her for her natural hair, according to an article on the news website Grio. There are black girls in South Africa that are fighting against a neo-colonial culture to be able to wear their hair naturally, as said in a CNN broadcast.
Instead of seeing his mistake and making an honest apology, Jacobs pulled the “I don’t see race” card in his apology. His “apology” just shows that Jacobs does not understand his own actions or the issues that accompany them.
(09/14/16 7:40pm)
If you would like to hear the beautiful sounds of string instruments on a Monday night, the upcoming McDuffie Student Concert is for you. The concert will feature students from the Mercer’s Robert McDuffie Center for Strings, who will perform both chamber pieces and solos in the salon of the Bell House located at 315 College Street. It will be held on Sept. 19 at 7:00 p.m. and is free to the public.
“In chamber groups, students learn how to work together as a team to produce a cohesive, unified sound,” Amy Moretti, director of the Center for Strings, said in an email. “This semester's theme is the quartets of Joseph Haydn, the father of the string quartet.”
“[Students] work with one of the Center’s distinguished faculty each week,” Moretti continued. “The faculty coach the group on technical aspects of the music, and because our faculty are professional musicians and have played most of the pieces assigned, they can describe their experience in learning and performing the piece.”
For more information on the McDuffie Center for Strings and upcoming concert information, visit http://departments.mercer.edu/mcduffie/.